Template talk:Style Voyage Tips and guide

This article was the Collaboration of the month for May 2020.

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Should articles needing attention have a message on them asking for them to be edited? (Like the {{stub}} message, but say {{style}} instead of stub.) The only way we can find these articles at present is by looking here, instead of on the page in question. If the articles in queston had a message on them that said that they needed work then perhaps more of them might be updated and corrected, and when they were people could remove them from this page. (Or the pages would not link here.) Or am I barking up the wrong tree? -- (WT-en) Huttite 21:26, 3 Jan 2005 (EST)

I think yes, I haven't gotten into the maintenance side of wikivoyage yet, but on my own articles I usually try and get all of the information out of my head and into the articles first and then later (sometimes several days....weeks later) try and do formating. I think being able to add a style tag at the end would help to notify other people that they can feel free to work on style and spelling, grammar etc. and would help them find the articles.(WT-en) Aburda 07:11, 25 Jul 2005 (EDT)

I agree that articles needing attention would benefit from a message. Go for it, Huttite! --(WT-en) Evan 08:00, 25 Jul 2005 (EDT)

Hmmm... I didn't know this page existed until today when I was called here for a different discussion... how about that. A style tag would be pretty cool and I'd contribute one if I had a clue. -- (WT-en) Ilkirk 17:07, 28 Oct 2005 (EDT)

Should this be a different color or style to differenciate it from the stub? -- (WT-en) Ilkirk 14:45, 17 Nov 2005 (EST)

Any objections to modifying this template's language so it refers to an "article or section" that doesn't match the MoS, as is done for the corresponding Wikipedia template? It might be helpful to be able to place it at the point in the article where there's a problem, if the article is otherwise in reasonable shape. I've done this experimentally for Calcutta, without however modifying the language. The result is not as aesthetic as one would like, but it's more informative than putting it at the top. Opinions? -- (WT-en) Bill-on-the-Hill 21:06, 22 November 2006 (EST)

I don't see why it would be an issue if the language was modified. As we say - plunge forward. Otherwise, maybe a seperate template would be acceptable, but I don't think it's necessary. -- (WT-en) Sapphire 21:12, 22 November 2006 (EST)

Done, then. It can always be rolled back ... -- (WT-en) Bill-on-the-Hill 21:58, 22 November 2006 (EST)

I don't think "helping it grow" is the actual issue here - sometimes an article is big enough, it just doesn't follow the MoS. I'm changing it for "help it improve", feel free to change to something else if you think improve isn't quite the word. -- (WT-en) Ricardo (Rmx) 18:02, 3 March 2007 (EST)

Agree. — (WT-en) Ravikiran 23:38, 3 March 2007 (EST)

There are currently over 200 articles that include this template, and it is often unclear why an editor added it to an article and whether the reason for the addition has been addressed. In particular, someone unfamiliar with Wikivoyage style guidelines might have no idea whatsoever what needs to be fixed. Would there be any objections to adding a "reason" parameter to the template that would allow the person including the template to add a note about why it is being added? Something like "Cleanups needed in this article include: {{{0}}}" where "{{{0}}}" would be something like "removal of promotional language and updates to the article template to use standard article headings"? -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 01:18, 24 February 2009 (EST)

I've added an optional argument to this template to allow a reason to be provided when adding the style tag. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 01:59, 26 October 2010 (EDT)

Since the additional argument can cause this template to take up more vertical space I've widened it from 60% to 70% of available width - the TOC can easily get bumped by this template if it gets much wider. If anyone feels that is worse visually please revert and we can discuss. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 02:34, 26 October 2010 (EDT)

*BUMP* Even as someone who has been contributing for many years I often see articles with "style" tags for which I can't determine why the tag was added, so a reminder to people who use this tag to please add a sentence or two explaining why the tag was added & how to fix any problems. For example:

{{style|Listings in this section do not follow the standard Wikivoyage [[Project:Listings|listing format]].}}

Thanks. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 22:41, 7 April 2011 (EDT)

Since this tag is still used in a huge number of articles without the "reason" argument I've added default text indicating that the article talk page should be used to discuss what is wrong with the article, although I'd still be hugely in favor of making sure that this tag is never used without providing a pointer to what needs to be fixed. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 16:27, 4 May 2011 (EDT)

Not a bad idea. I think it would look nicer if we get rid of the line break. What do you think? (WT-en) texugo 08:16, 5 May 2011 (EDT)

Sounds reasonable. It might also make sense to shorten the intro text (and thus shrink the box slightly) by changing the first paragraph to just "This article or section does not match our manual of style or needs other editing. Please help it improve!" - the "plunge forward" link and especially the "articles needing attention" link seem unnecessary given the purpose of the tag. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 11:04, 5 May 2011 (EDT)

I added the broom icon from Wikipedia to this template as an eye-catching way of indicating what the template is for. These sorts of icons grab attention, as opposed to having people just gloss over text, and using the same icon as Wikipedia should hopefully make it clear to people who are familiar with that site what the box is there for. However, in the past people have occasionally spoken out against changes that make Wikivoyage more like Wikipedia, so suggestions for alternatives or for returning to the status quo would be welcome. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 00:30, 1 August 2011 (EDT)

I like the broom icon there. Could we maybe get rid of the line break before "suggested fixes"? I absolutely hate the way it displays on my browser (very long line, very short line, very long line, very short line). (WT-en) texugo 02:54, 1 August 2011 (EDT)

Done. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 10:43, 1 August 2011 (EDT)

Looks good, nice work. --(WT-en) globe-trotter 08:57, 3 August 2011 (EDT)

I like it better too. Could we possibly un-bold "Suggested fixes" and italicize that and the rest of the message? This would be to reduce the number of text formats jumbled together in this space, of which there are currently at least 6 (normal, normal link, italics, italics link, bold, bold italics link, etc.). I think it looks rather jumbled-y as it is now. (WT-en) texugo 11:15, 3 August 2011 (EDT)

I removed the italics entirely, which eliminates one of the formatting styles - is that acceptable? I think the bold is helpful for calling out the important part (how to fix the issue) and it follows the precedent set by Wikipedia (see for example wikipedia:Apollo 11#Support crew. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 01:55, 4 August 2011 (EDT)

It's better without italics, but I still don't like "Suggested fixes" in bold, and don't think that is the most important thing to highlight, especially in the majority of cases where no suggestions have been given. (WT-en) texugo 02:45, 4 August 2011 (EDT)

I actually think "suggested fixes" is the most important thing since it gives a reader specific guidance about what needs to be done to fix the issue, even when displaying the default text. Perhaps others can provide some input. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 09:15, 4 August 2011 (EDT)

Be that as it may, it is still ordered as a secondary point within the short notification, and I think the whole box is short enough not to need a big black bold call for that much attention on the second line out of 2 or 3, especially when, as I said, it is most often followed by a message stating that there are no suggested fixes. Gonna insist it looks weird. (WT-en) texugo 09:46, 4 August 2011 (EDT)

I don't think the bold looks weird at all. Rather it draws attention to the most important part of the notification. An all-round excellent job I think Ryan.--(WT-en) Burmesedays 10:05, 4 August 2011 (EDT)

It might be nice to standardize this template with some of the similar editorial notice templates such as Template:Vfd and Template:Merge. Here's the current version:

This article or section does not match our manual of style or needs other editing. Please plunge forward, give it your attention and help it improve! Suggested fixes: Listings should be converted to use listing tags.

...and here's a proposed change that uses the same style as the vfd & merge templates:

This article or section does not match our manual of style or needs other editing. Please plunge forward, give it your attention and help it improve! Suggested fixes: None specified. Please use the article's talk page to ask questions if you are not sure why this tag was added and whether it is safe to remove it.

Any thoughts or suggestions? -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 19:39, 23 September 2011 (EDT)

Yep, works for me. (WT-en) texugo 23:53, 23 September 2011 (EDT)

Any other comments? -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 22:28, 26 September 2011 (EDT)

This update has been made. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 00:05, 29 September 2011 (EDT)

I've been thinking about getting more consistency in these boxes, just like Wikipedia has them. I've updated the Template:Style and Template:Advert templates to using the new Ambox format (similar to WP):

This article does not match our manual of style or needs other editing. Plunge forward and help it improve!

Also I've done the documentation in a similar style as to WP. I think it's a huge improvement and makes the site seem more professional and consistent. Also, the box is smaller and takes up less space, while still being effective. However, I'm looking for more input before I apply this to other boxes as well. It can always be reverted of course, in case people don't like it. What are your opinions on it? --Globe-trotter (talk) 19:40, 11 October 2012 (CEST)

The display of this template is a little off on mobile (see mw:Recommendations_for_mobile_friendly_articles_on_Wikimedia_wikis and phab:T214653)

Jdlrobson (talk) 16:33, 6 February 2019 (UTC)Reply

The instructions say:

"If the entire article contains style issues then the tag should be added to the top of the article...."

I think this should be changed to put the tag at the bottom of the article.

• This is an internal Wikivoyage matter. Housekeeping tags are not of interest to casual readers. Putting the traveller first means not putting these as the guest thing they read in an article.
• It is only regular contributors who will act to address style issues. It is naive to think that new readers are going to be motivated to start editing Wikivoyage because they see a style tag at the top of an article.
• These tags don't actually lead to much work being done. Most of them have been sitting around for years.

Let's not put housekeeping tags front and centre. Ground Zero (talk) 13:25, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Support and per continuation re Talk:Yorke Peninsula. The only housekeeping tag I'd suggest keeping at the top is {{copyvio}} since that's a serious matter. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 13:34, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Agreed. Some tagged articles have moderate MoS issues that aren’t important enough to readers to be prominently featured. Readers are interested in travel content, not violations of formatting rules. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 14:32, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Copyright and MoS issues are internal, uninteresting to the reader regardless of seriousness. I haven't seen much warnings for content, but if we have those (obsolete or doubtful content), they are useful for the reader. A borderline case is embarrassing articles, where we want to tell that the article isn't representative for our quality standard. –LPfi (talk) 15:13, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

I'm not aware that we have "dubious" tags. I would hope that editors would just remove or comment out the dubious text rather than leaving it there. I do not think we have any tag for low-quality (embarrassing) articles. Such tags would not be useful at this stage of Wikivoyage's development. Unfortunately some editors think they are being helpful by identifying flaws for other editors to fix. Because of the shortage of other editors, this activity is not helpful. Let's not create more tag clutter. Ground Zero (talk) 15:46, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

If we don't have them (and I am not proposing creating them), then all tags can be at the end. I am not even sure they need to be visible, as they would be found primarily through maintenance categories. If they are always placed after PartOf and geo, then they don't bother even walk-by editors, and any free-text comments can easily be found by looking at the source of the last section. –LPfi (talk) 17:08, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

I agree with LPfi that all style tags should be at the bottom ofvthe article, i.e., not at the top or in a section, so the text of the tag would be changed to delete the reference to "or section", I.e.,

"This article or section does not match our manual of style or needs other editing. Plunge forward with these suggested fixes: Listings should be converted to use the standardized Wikivoyage listing templates."

Ground Zero (talk) 17:16, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Perhaps such a change should require also suggesting a reason parameter, as in some cases the problem may not be obvious, and often the problem has been rectified without removing the template. It is very frustrating to try to correct a problem you cannot see, but cannot be sure isn't there. –LPfi (talk) 17:40, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

A reason parameter is already recommended with this tag. I don't know if it is possible to require a reason. I think tags work if you leave the reason blank. I think it is reasonable to remove a tag that provides no reason if you can't figure out what is wrong. Ground Zero (talk) 17:44, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

OK, sorry not to have checked. –LPfi (talk) 18:52, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

No worries. In reviewing the "move to city" tags, I've found some articles where it was put on sections that didn't even have detailed listings. Sometimes people just slap these on anything that isn't written in prose, which is not what the tag is for. Ground Zero (talk) 18:58, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

In 2013, an editor added "move to city" tags to four sections of Curaçao, even though the island has only one city article. For eight years they sat as pointless clutter. I've removed them so the article looks better now. Ground Zero (talk) 18:09, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

And in this case, an experienced editor put a "move to city" tags on a block of hotel listings that were in the region article that had to be moved to that region's only city article. They did this instead of just moving the listings themselves. And the tag sat there for 3 years. <rant ends> Ground Zero (talk) 19:28, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

I support this proposal. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:46, 24 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Done. Ground Zero (talk) 12:58, 31 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Swept in from the pub

Came to mind today, and am posting this in the pub, because this applies to most style tags.

However, back to the main point. Since style tags only give a bad look on Wikivoyage, and not to say they're not even relevant to readers, was thinking so that they could only be visible to those who are autoconfirmed. Some reasons why:

• Style tags are not of interest to travelers
• These are an internal issue
• They only give a bad look on voy
• It doesn't look so unusual when printing an page out
• Things like {{Movetocity}} tags are only something that contributors should worry about, not readers. If we really want to make a note of newbies to not add individual listings to region or huge city articles, this should be handled in an edit notice or invisible text, such as the one I added in Vancouver.
• Most readers don't have an account
• Those who are not autoconfirmed are very likely newbies who are not coming from another WMF project such as Wikipedia, unless they have never visited Wikivoyage under a registered account.

Moreover, the chance of a non-autoconfirmed user fixing up style tags is very low, unless it's either:

• a block evading user
• Those like User:82.3.185.12, who refuse to create an account (although this IP user has retired)

The only ones that I'd say making it visible to all users:

• {{copyvio}}
• {{vfd}}
• {{speedy}}

Although I guess these aren't even classified as "style" tags, but still should be mentioned somewhere.

• (edit 10:20) style tags that require local knowledge.

--SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 06:49, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

See also Template talk:Style#Move to the bottom of the article and the other related discussions. This proposal has not been discussed, but there may be relevant points in those.

I believe the proposal as such is not possible, at least not without complicated code, which would be hard to maintain. Do templates have access to user information? The way this is handled in other cases, such as phone number format errors, is by marking the code as invisible in CSS and overriding that CSS with javascript in a gadget. That gadget does not magically get enabled when the user gets autoconfirmed.

Do we have a list of style tags somewhere? We should have a category for them. Without a list of the tags the proposal is intended to cover, it is hard to say that none of them is relevant to a non-autoconfirmed reader.

–LPfi (talk) 08:48, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

I know the English Wikipedia has w:Template:If autoconfirmed. I suppose we could do something like that, but I'm not sure how to get that same code to work here. Would defer to @Andyrom75: who may know how to. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 09:01, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

It uses the CSS classes "autoconfirmed-show" and "unconfirmed-show", so the code itself is simple. But where is the CSS rule to show or not show elements of those classes? common.js? That means the script has access to such variables, which I didn't know. –LPfi (talk) 11:01, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

It doesn't seem to work here, but I think we need an interface admin to make it work on MediaWiki:common.js, which for us, @Andyrom75: is the only active int admin around. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 11:04, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

The value of making these visible to readers and new users is that it might encourage them become contributors and help fix the problem. This applies especially to issues that require local knowledge, like districting discussions. —Granger (talk · contribs) 10:15, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

I suppose things like districting discussions could also be added to an exceptions list + the other ones that require local knowledge. Wasn't thinking about that when writing this message, but well, that's added to the exceptions list SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 10:20, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

Technically is not difficult to adopt this behavior, but first must exist a consensus on the approach. --Andyrom75 (talk) 11:07, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

Let's first have a list of templates that we want affected. Remove those that shouldn't been hidden. If any remains, and hiding it for the non-autoconfirmed is thought to be highly wanted, then we should implement the functionality and can add it to more tags. Perhaps we should begin with a short list where hiding is seen as highly beneficial. –LPfi (talk) 11:27, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

I think we should think about rewording the messages in these tags, so that they are aimed at readers rather editors. If a reader looks at a huge city article and sees four hotels listed, they might think that these are the only hotels in the whole city.

For example, change Template:Movetodistrict to say something like: "This is a huge city article, so you will find the listings in the district articles. This article only provides a brief overview." AlasdairW (talk) 22:53, 2 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

@AlasdairW We already do that at the top of all huge city articles anyway (such as Toronto), which usually say "{{PAGENAME}} is a huge city with several district articles that contain information about specific sights, restaurants, and accommodation.". Maybe it could also be added onto each and every section too. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 00:49, 3 December 2021 (UTC)Reply